Jac Holzman started his career in the record industry by licensing European albums for release in America. In the 1950s he began his own record label, Elektra/Nonesuch Records, and in the 1960s he firmly established both labels by bringing new performers and composers to the American and European public. Among the composers he was first to record was Scott Joplin — the subject of this interview with Jac Holzman, a legend in his own time.
How did you first become aware of Scott Joplin's music?
I didn't know anything about Scott Joplin. I made two bright moves in points in my life in regards to the Nonesuch label. One was taking Josh Rifkin out of the Even Dozen Jug Band and making him a musical consultant to Nonesuch. He played kazoo and occasionally piano in the Even Dozen Jug Band.
The other wise move was taking a former secretary to Seymour Solomon of Vanguard and making her my administrative assistant to Nonesuch. Theresa Sterne. She became my full administrative assistant at Nonesuch and about a year and a half or two years later I turned over the full management of the label to her.
The way we had it set up was originally that Nonesuch material was licensed from small European companies that had interesting catalogues of musical merit... I would take the best out of those catalogues. Occasionally I would make albums on my own, and this was more and more the case with Nonesuch as the years went on, and as these other sources dried up or as competition to get the records from these same sources increased.
We had a free sailing period of about a year at Nonesuch where nobody could believe the success of the label and consequently we scooped up everything we could. As time wore on we were forced to make more of our own records, but it turned out that this was a very good set of circumstances. You really can't be a record company merely by licensing.
The Joplin thing started because evidently Josh Rifkin was aware of these works through his own research and that of Bill Bulcom, and he suggested to Theresa Sterne that it might be a good idea to make such an album. My arrangement with Theresa was such that no album would be made without me knowing something about the nature of the record and the budget, but invariably I would consent to any of the records she suggested as she was extremely sympathetic to all of the people who would come to her office.
She came in one day and talked to me about doing an album of rags by Scott Joplin, to which I said "Who the hell is Scott Joplin?" And she said "Maple Leaf Rag" which I did know, and I said "Who would play them?" and she said that Josh wanted to play them.
When Josh had recorded with the Even Dozen Jug Band, he had recorded one rag called "Original Colossal Drag Rag" back in 1963, and I did recall Josh's rag playing. I asked her what the budget was, she told me under a thousand dollars, so I gave her the go ahead and we went ahead and made the record.
We did not expect any miracles. We issued the record with very good notes, what we thought was an appropriate cover, but from the first day it was out, it sold — a classic example of word-of-mouth spreading instantaneously. It made us all look like heroes. My function in the whole Joplin thing was of being a permissive midwife; I did not originate the idea, I permitted it to happen... but then again, I never stopped what seemed like a good idea.
How soon after the first record did you decide to record a second volume of Scott Joplin rags played by Joshua Rifkin?
We decided to do Volume II pretty soon afterwards, Josh was as surprised at what had happened as we were. He'd always considered himself a very serious musicologist who turns out about five to ten minutes of memorable music a year, and I think he felt some reticence at getting typed as a ragtime pianist.
Although we decided that we wanted a second album very quickly, we had to give Josh some time to think it all over. He did make a good second album, and as a matter of fact he's just completed a third. But I don't think there'll be any more.
What was the effect of this success upon the Nonesuch label?
We had any number of extremely knowledgeable people drawn to the label because they trusted Theresa, who is an extraordinary individual. She's very careful about how records are made and she's very well respected in serious music circles.
We were able to do some other rag albums, but one thing that
Nonesuch has never done is beat a trend to death. We had obviously started something here, and we wanted to achieve a balance between being effective by doing very careful work in the field although we were anxious to sell as many records as we could, but we didn't want to go running after the dollar.
Nonesuch has introduced many new composers to the Schwann catalogue, but it's been a classical label that's always been a moneymaker; we've never had a losing year, and I don't think you can say the same of any other classical label in the United States. It's always been profitable, sometimes extremely so, and the parent company
Elektra has used the profits in various times to get itself more thoroughly entrenched in the pop music field — to sign people like the Doors, Love and the Butterfield Blues Band.
Was Nonesuch ever more commercially successful than Elektra?
No,
Elektra was founded in 1953 and
Nonesuch didn't come along along until 1963.
In 1964,
Nonesuch and
Elektra were just about neck and neck in profits; in 1972-73 it was probably about ten-to-one, Elektra over
Nonesuch, but by then we had Carly Simon, Judy Collins, and a number of artists of that calibre of popularity.
Nonesuch has continued to grow slowly.
I would assume that the Nonesuch albums would be able to maintain a fairly steady sales through the years.
Sure, you're talking about a list price considerably lower than the regular record, in a list price ranging between 2.98 dollars and 3.98 dollars. The Joplin record was originally 2.98 dollars but I believe it's 3.98 dollars now, as opposed to 6.98 dollars list for pop music records.
Whose decision was it for this list price?
Originally it was mine, but I didn't want to make it a budget label, I wanted it to be priced around what it would cost for a quality paperback and give the dealer an extra incentive discount for display, giving him an extra-added ten percent off the list price by making the albums 2.50 dollars, making them a bit more special than the 1.98 dollars things that were bouncing around Macy's bargain basement. It was a sensible price, and at the time exactly half of the list price for a classical record.
Do you feel that this contributed to the popularity of the Joplin record?
The Joplin record would have sold at 5.98 dollars, but the price did contribute to the firm establishment of the
Nonesuch label in the mid-Sixties when there were no new records in this price category.
It was a new approach to classical music, where people wrote lucid, meaningful liner notes taking into account the social milieu which surrounded the writing or playing of the music. The covers were distinctive, apt and sometimes even humorous when called for, it was a hipper DGG type of approach... reaching for an audience that was not especially affluent.
Other labels tried to get into this category and tried to... I won't say "rip us off"... but more or less imitate us. When that happened, we just laid low, cutting our number of albums from 50 or 60 a year to 10 or 15 a year. We cut way back, letting them knock each other off, and in time they did, finding out that there wasn't that much money to be made.
They retreated somewhat allowing us to re-emerge and once again dominate. It was a very calculated move to hold back.
And it was the same type of move when the other companies jumped on your Joplin bandwagon?
It was just that you couldn't find enough first rate material and first rate performance and we did not want to get typed as a ragtime label. The balance of the
Nonesuch catalogue and the
Nonesuch approach was, in the long run, far more important than any extra money we could make in the short run. The integrity of the label was always what was important; the fact that
Nonesuch and Theresa are able to get music and co-operation, composers and little favours that she needs to get these records out is what makes
Nonesuch a superb label.
Had the Nonesuch label been doing a lot of recording for awhile, or was Josh Rifkin's Scott Joplin album one of the first home-grown products?
No, they'd been doing a lot of recording before then, a tremendous amount, especially from around 1968 on. At the time the Joplin album was recorded, in 1970. I would say that we were making about 50 to 60 percent of our own records.
What was your immediate reaction when you saw all of the labels starting to put out Scott Joplin records?
I'd seen it all happen before. If you suddenly can come up with a singing shark, 18 guys are going to go out and find singing sharks. Having been in the music business for twenty-three years, I had seen this trend - following not only in music but in motion pictures as well. Unfortunately, "copycatism" is very much part of the nature of pop culture. All you can do is view it with some kind of amusement and don't let yourself get suckered in by it — hold out for the best because the pursuit of excellence is what's fun. We didn't
own the show. It belonged to who ever wanted to pursue it.
What about the use of the music in The Sting?
From what I am given to understand, that was a last minute thing with the picture, and from a period standpoint, it didn't belong in the picture at all. It gives the picture a kind of lighthearted bounce, which was probably a good idea, but there were one or two small errors that Josh had made in his performance of the music which Hamlisch copied exactly in his recording.
I believe that they were so desperate for liner notes at the last minute that they asked permission to reprint our notes which we did not give. The music was of a period 30 years before the picture was supposed to take place, 30 to 40 years earlier... but that never stopped anybody.
All in all, though, it seems that the popularisation of Scott Joplin's music through The Sting will have an overall beneficial effect, wouldn't you say?
If they can't get beyond "The Entertainer". The performances on the Hamlisch album aren't bad, although they are a little wooden. If they go beyond that to investigate other rag material, it's a marvellous part of our American musical culture, it's fine; popularisation never really hurt anything. We use up pop culture trends very quickly in this country, the only danger is that the material loses a kind of "hipness" which makes people put them down shortly after the fame, which means it takes another 20 years before people can take the music seriously again. Insofar as it encourages people to look at other composers of the era that worked in the same genre, it's beneficial. The public makes all the ultimate decisions, and actually they're pretty smart.